3.4.0 Matrix Server Administration Guide

Chapter 9: Manage Hardware Snapshots 105

Create a Snapshot or Snapclone

A snapshot is a space-efficient reflection of a source filesystem at a

particular point in time. Snapshots initially consume storage space only

to store pointers to the data in the source filesystem, growing in size

when source filesystem data is changed. Snapshots can be fully-allocated

(the maximum amount of storage space is reserved at creation time), or

demand-allocated (the minimum amount of storage space is reserved at

creation time, allocating more as necessary). Snapshots are intended to be

temporary.

A snapclone is similar to a snapshot, except that it completely copies the

source filesystem data at a particular point in time. When you create a

snapshot, you can specify whether you want a fully-allocated snapshot, a

demand-allocated snapshot, or a complete-copy snapclone.

Snapshots can be both readable and writable and there can often be

multiple snapshots existing of a filesystem at a time.

To create a snapshot, select the filesystem on the Management Console,

right-click, and select Create Snapshot. You will then see a dialog asking

for information specific to your storage array.